


watch over the asters

by serj



Category: Kagerou Project
Genre: F/M, SetoMary Spring
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-11
Updated: 2016-04-11
Packaged: 2018-06-01 16:30:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 953
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6527593
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/serj/pseuds/serj
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“The flowers need to go.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	watch over the asters

There was a certain dissatisfaction in being the employee to discard of wilted flowers, unwanted buds whose wrinkled petals and browning leaves deemed them ineligible for sale. 

“Is there any other way to get rid of these?” Seto asked of his coworker one afternoon, gazing reproachfully upon the somber load in his arms. “A discount sale?” 

“No one would buy them,” was her disinterested reply. “They’re invalids now, so to speak.”

He huffed out a breath. The flowers would die with certainty, but it seemed a pity for them to wilt at the bottom of a dumpster amongst the rats and crumpled soda cans instead of a peaceful meadow. If he couldn’t give them a wide open space to thrive, he could at least give them a home before their time ran out. And with his busy work schedule, he knew just the person to care for them.

 

The sky was streaked with orange. Tulips fighting off the last of winter’s frosts sprouted up in terracotta pots on someone’s front stoop, the door painted in robin’s egg blue standing above as if to guard them. The flowers reminded Seto of the bundle he carried, and he ran, ran home to put them in water before the sun dropped below the skyline and submerged the city in darkness. 

Mary was in the kitchen, watching Kido make dinner and talking in a slow, sleepy voice that told Seto she had just woken up from a late afternoon nap. When he appeared in the doorway with the bunches of flowers drooping in his tired arms, she lifted her head up off the counter to watch as he placed them gently beside her.

“Will you help me take care of these? The florist shop doesn’t want them anymore, since they’re dying.” 

“Of course!” Full of renewed energy, she hopped down from her stool and held the vases steady as he filled them with water and lined the table with an array of savable flowers. Kido watched them silently, but from the look in her eyes he could tell she was only tolerating this because nothing had gone wrong yet. One false move, and it was goodbye to the orphaned buds. 

The flowers lasted no more than a day or two, but Mary had clever ideas and when Seto brought home more from the shop (the house was filled with them now, every windowsill occupied and a tolerating Kido eyeing them ruefully), she suggested taking the seeds from those that supplied them and planting them in separate flowerpots, to start anew. When the first spring rains fell, they enlisted Kano and the three of them raced outside with the pots, letting the flowers drink in the sweet water and the following warmth of sunshine. Kido had by now given up her scornful looks in regards to their new collection. She was the only one that remembered to water them. 

 

But every good thing must come to an end, and when Mary knocked on her bedroom door one morning and asked if she could bring a pot full of daisies in, having no space anywhere else, Kido put her foot down.

“The flowers need to go.”

Seto begged and Mary pleaded, and even Kano agreed she was being unreasonable. Eventually, they reached a hesitant compromise. They could keep a few arrays of flowers, and the rest had to be replanted somewhere else. 

"No one will take them," Seto sighed one afternoon upon returning from a trip to the local grocery. "And we can't plant them in the park- the city workers don't want them there, either."

"Hmm." Mary rested her hands on her chin, staring down at the plant in front of her. Shion was its name, lavender-colored petals with a center as yellow as the sun. " _Shion_..." she blinked, and Seto saw a look of realization cross her face. "I know where we can take them! To the forest!"

 

She hadn’t been to her mother’s grave since the day she left. 

It was settled behind the long-unfunctional cottage, surrounded by a grove of trees and heavy shrubbery. Vines hung so low that they clung to the headstone. Kneeling, Mary brushed them aside to read the engraving, though she already knew what it said. 

Seto stood quietly behind her, afraid to encroach upon the reunion. Mary tucked a strand of hair behind her ear as she whispered something, words for only her mother to hear. He was considering giving her more space when she turned to face him, eyes red-rimmed but a smile on her face.

“The flowers?” She asked, voice barely audible.

“Right.” He joined her in front of the grave, scooping the powder-purple asters out of the pot and placing them, gently as possible with steady hands, into the hole she had dug in front of the stone. He patted down the dirt, hands meeting Mary’s in front of the flower. 

“Mom?” She whispered, and from the curt nod she gave a moment later, Seto almost imagined Mary heard a reply. “This is Seto. I told you about him, remember? He’s taking care of me now. So you don’t have to worry about it. You just-” He nearly missed the teardrop that weighed down the aster’s leaf like the first drop of rain at the start of a downpour. “Rest, now.”

Mary glanced up at Seto with a resigned sigh, indicating she was ready to head back home along the brambly path they had climbed to get here. He stretched out his hand and she took it, hauling herself up and using the other to dust off her dress. 

“She’ll watch over the asters,” Mary decided as they swung arms, fingers interlaced. Somewhere nearby, a sparrow chirped.


End file.
